<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>moonlight by aeonian_jade</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29826768">moonlight</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeonian_jade/pseuds/aeonian_jade'>aeonian_jade</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>sakura month 2021 [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Naruto</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/F, Inspired by The Highwayman - Alfred Noyes</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 20:35:25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>991</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29826768</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeonian_jade/pseuds/aeonian_jade</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>a tale of two lovers and a moon in the sky - what could be a better tragedy?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Haruno Sakura/Hyuuga Hinata</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>sakura month 2021 [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2188518</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>moonlight</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The moon is a coin of pure silver in the velvet sky when Sakura walks through the abandoned streets. She reaches the inn and Mebuki lets her in, her flaxen hair shines in the dark as a smile glints on her mouth.</p><p>As Sakura passes Mebuki, she asks:</p><p>“Is she here yet?”</p><p>Mebuki shakes her head. “Not yet.”</p><p>Sakura smiles. “Thank you.”</p><p>Mebuki winks and says, “Don’t let your father hear you two lovebirds.”</p><p>Sakura giggles as she climbs the stairs.</p><p>:</p><p>The wind gusts through the trees, a torrent amongst the branches. The road is a ribbon of moonlight amongst the heather-filled purple moor. Hinata comes riding on her horse to the inn, the horse’s shoes clattering and clashing on the cobbled inn-yard. </p><p>A French cocked-hat on her forehead as a wave of dark hair cascades over her claret red coat. A bunch of lace at her chin and breeches of brown doe-skin, the horse neighing under her tight grip. Hinata’s  boots up to her thigh and her pistols and her rapier a jewelled twinkle under the sky, she rides with a calm face, eyes looking for her love. </p><p>Sakura is plaiting a dark red love-knot into her candy-pink hair when she hears the whip tapping on the shutters. She rushes to the door when Hinata starts whistling a tune. When she opens the door, her green eyes sparkling, Hinata jumps off her horse with a jangle and embraces her.</p><p>Deep and dark in the stable yard, a stable wicket creaks as Neiji listens to the lovers talk. His face is white and peaked, eyes hollows of madness as the seal on his forehead burns. His hair like volcano ash, he listens to his cousin and the landlord’s daughter whisper and talk. Dumb as a dog, he listens to his cousin say:</p><p>“One kiss, Sakura, my sun, otherwise I will burn to ash in your embrace. I’m after a prize to-night but I will be back with the yellow-gold treasure before the morning light. Watch for me in the moonlight, my love and I’ll come to thee  by moonlight though hell should bar the way.”</p><p>His features twist as he listens and an idea comes to him in exchange for his soul. He smiles with wickedness and sneaks away with the moon.</p><p>Hinata leans against her horse and Sakura comes to hold her hand. Hinata loosens her hair and Sakura’s face burns like a brand. The perfumed locks comes tumbling over her breast and she kisses the sweet waves in the moonlight.</p><p>Then, Hinata jumps on her horse, tugs the rein and gallops away to the west.</p><p>:</p><p>Hinata doesn’t return in the dawning, nor the noon. Out of the tawny sunset, when the sun is drowning in rays of peach and gold, before the rise of the moon and when the road is a gypsy’s ribbon, looping the purple moor, a tropp with the uchiwa on the back of their clothes come marching up to the old inn door.</p><p>They say no to Kizashi but drink his ale and gag and bind his daughter to the foot of her narrow bed. Two of them kneel at her side with muskets in their hand.</p><p>They tie her up with jests pouring out their mouths and a musket beneath her breast. They kiss her red lips and she twists the hands behind her but the knots hold; she writhes her hands until ehr fingers are slick with sweat and blood. They stretch and strain in the dark as the hours crawl like aeons. </p><p>On the stroke of midnight, one daring finger touches the trigger - alas, it is hers!</p><p>Sakura didn’t strive for the rest. </p><p>Up! She stands for attention with the muzzle beneath her breast!</p><p>Sakura wouldn’t risk them hearing nor would strive again.</p><p>The road lies bare in the moonlight, blank and bare, and the blood in her veins throb to the pulse of her lover.</p><p>Tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot!</p><p>Had they heard that?</p><p>The horseshoes clashing and clattering on the cobbles in the distance?</p><p>Were they deaf - they did not hear?</p><p>Down the ribbon of moonlight and over the brow of the hill, Hinata comes riding and riding and riding. The troops with uchiwa on their backs look!</p><p>Sakura stands, straight and still.</p><p>Tlot-tlot! Tlot-tlot!</p><p>In the frosty silence, Sakura wishes for the first time that her love did not come back to her.</p><p>Nearer and nearer, Hinata comes in the echoing night. </p><p>To her sun, the moth comes daringly, lovingly.</p><p>To the jaws of hell, she rides the ribbon of moonlight.</p><p>Sakura’s green eyes go wide in the moonlight, her face like a pale light. Then her finger moves and shatters her breast in the moonlight, shatters her breast and warns her with her death in the moonlight.</p><p>Hinata turns, spurring to the west, not knowing who stands over the musket with her breast drenched in blood! Not until dawn, she hears it. Not until the sun that didn’t die rose, she hears it and Hinata’s face goes grey when it is whispered to her: the rumour of how Sakura, the landlord’s daughter had watched for her love in the moonlight and died in the darkness there.</p><p>Back, she wants to spurr, shrieking a curse to the sky!</p><p>Back, she wants to spurr, with her love watching her in the sky!</p><p>Hinata jumps in her spurrs and rides her horse to the cobbled inn yard but with the white road smoking behind her and her rapier brandishes high, who stands before her then and shoots her down like a dog on the highway?</p><p>Blood red are her spurs in the golden noon, wine-red are her velvet coat when Neiji shoots her down on the highway with a bunch of lace at her leaking throat.</p><p>Neiji cackles on the highway and the devil comes to collect his soul for finally he has vengeance for his father and eternity must he slave in hell.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>for day three of haruno sakura month, i decided to write a ficlet based on the iconic poem the highwayman but with a hinasaku twist</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>